Gritting my teeth, I leap from one swaying platform to another. There’s a whine as one of the automatic guns swivels my way, but I hit it with a shotgun blast, enough to knock the tracking out, at least. Shots rain down on each side of the wagon, targeting the G’hals, but Rat and Bui laugh and swerve away, leaving the armoured windows too smeared and filthy for the soldiers to see through. Grimly, I sling the weapon over my good shoulder and haul myself up onto the roof.
The wind strikes me with the force of raging water, but I keep my head down, squinting at the stretch of metal before me. One gun turret, battered and dented and spattered with grime, but still operational. I claw my way towards it, breath snatched away, watching as the mechanism jerks and spins, as the red light declares me a target. With a surge of effort I throw myself forwards, using all my weight to push the gun down as it fires.
Charges ricochet from the roof, searing the air inches from my feet as the gun strains to right itself. I won’t be able to hold it for much longer. With my bad arm I pull a knife and – gritting my teeth against the pain in my shoulder – jam the blade into the hydraulics, twisting and ripping at the cable.
There are sparks and a shock jolts through me, sending my arm flying, the knife clattering from my grip. The turret sags downwards.
My palm is burned from the shock, muscles fizzing, but there’s no time to think about it. I crawl forwards, until I can peer down at the last platform before the Iron Slug.
It’s miraculously unguarded. Breath heaving, I lower myself awkwardly from the roof, but halfway down my shoulder spasms and I fall sprawling onto the metal.
Before I can even swear, I realise my mistake. Two shotgunners stand in the open doorway, weapons pointed down at me. There’s nothing I can do, nowhere to go except…
As they open fire I roll from the edge of the platform, catching myself by my fingertips.
The bright silver blade of the Air Line rushes by below. My boots scramble for purchase on the wagon’s side and slip, my sweat-slick fingers giving out, my shoulder screaming in agony.
There’s a flash of movement, and I look up, directly into the barrels of a shotgun.
‘Doc!’
The soldier above me falls back, blood spraying from the inch of flesh where the armoured uniform meets his chin. His gun falls, almost striking me in the face before being swept away. I glance over my shoulder. Falco’s mare races alongside, Peg balanced on the seat, hair streaming out, grimacing in pain as they aim the pistol again. Another cry and the second soldier goes spinning from the edge of the platform. With every scrap of strength I have left, I hook my fingers onto the floor panels and worm my way back on.
‘Doc, hurry!’
Peg aims over my head, where at any moment more soldiers will appear.
I look up. Not six feet away is the Iron Slug, with its smooth sides, its narrow platform. I drag myself into a crouch, ready to leap—
My body, riddled with bullet holes, tumbles onto the tracks. A gun jams into my scalp from behind and bursts my head open. I hang from the platform as someone stamps on my fingers, kicking me away to be crushed beneath the Air Line. I cower, hands over my head as Falco and Peg are hit by a strike that sends them flying like rag dolls; my eyes fill with fire as the train is engulfed in an explosion…
No! I cry silently. Show me!
Just for a second, there is an overwhelming sense of being seen. They hear me, I realise, in a split-second of horror, before one image shines clear through the rest: that of a gun turret.
I flatten myself against the platform as a hail of charges bursts from one of the Slug’s guns. I scream, expecting to feel the charges pierce my flesh but there’s a roar, a flash of light and I open one eye to see the gun swivelling, locking on to another target…
‘Falco!’ I scream.
Her eye meets mine and she throws the mare onto its side, skidding through the dirt as the Slug fires, filling the air with deadly light and splinters of rock dust, charges thudding into the body of the vehicle. The mare explodes, the blast echoing from the canyon walls.
My cry is lost in the noise, even as the targeting beam pivots back towards me.
This time, I don’t wait. I struggle up and leap, crashing clumsily onto the polished platform of the Slug. Before I can pull the pistol from my holster the beams split, one swinging to take me in its sight, the other flashing as it pinpoints a mare racing towards the flaming mess of Falco’s vehicle.
I plunge my hand into the jacket and drag out the only thing I have left: the oxygen canister. I throw it into the narrow aperture around the gun and fire the pistol before I even think about what I’m doing. The explosion sends me reeling, the gun tumbling from my grip as I flail to hold on.
I can barely breathe, let alone stay upright, my head filled with ringing. Another panel slides back and a second automatic gun appears, smoke billowing around it. When it swings down to aim at me, there is nothing I can do.
A rumble, a glare of light and the beam swings away, pointing up at a dark shape that drops from the sky, flying terrifyingly close to the walls of the canyon. It’s the Charis.
Silas! I try to shout, but there is no air in my lungs, and I watch in horror as the Slug opens fire, punching holes in the Charis’s belly, sending her pin-balling from one rock wall to another.
Then from above there’s a sudden clank, and
